


Later

by FactoryKat



Series: The Mages' Champion and the Healer's Hope - The Wyatt Hawke Collection [4]
Category: Dragon Age II
Genre: Anders Lives, Anders Needs a Hug, Anders Positive, Blue-Purple Hawke, Custom Hawke, Dragon Age II Quest - The Last Straw, Endgame, Justice, Love, M/M, Mage Hawke (Dragon Age), Mage Rights, Mage-Templar War, Mages and Templars, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-13
Updated: 2019-02-13
Packaged: 2019-10-27 13:41:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,466
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17767841
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FactoryKat/pseuds/FactoryKat
Summary: After the chantry explodes, Anders is ready to accept his fate, to go down with his cause. He waits for it, having already made peace with his choices but Hawke is having none of it.





	Later

**Author's Note:**

> Post chantry explosion, set in the endgame. Sparing Anders and supporting the mages.

Anders hadn't moved yet, not a single muscle. Still slumped over on that crate, the wood groaned even under his paltry weight while he sat, pondering what would eventually come his actions now and silently making peace with it all and with whatever would come. In spite of his posture, he planned to accept the end with grace and without argument.

But nothing ever went according to plan, did it?

“Anders.."

He pointedly ignored the call of his name. “I warned you. You cannot say that I didn’t-”

Metal clinked and leather creaked in time with the sound of heavy steps hitting stone, back and forth, back and forth. Pacing. Hawke was agitated. Of course he was. The man had every right to be. 

_“Anders-”_ Came the pleading voice from behind him again. 

_WHY DO YOU WALLOW HERE?_ A familiar spectral voice echoed in his ears, not in any natural way but more like a memory drifting through his thoughts. Justice was more than a memory though, and his presence still haunted the mage, always lingering just beneath his own consciousness. _THERE IS MORE YET TO BE DONE, ANDERS. TO GIVE UP NOW WOULD BE AMOUNT TO COWARDICE._

Justice chided him, Hawke beckoned him. Again, he tuned out both, shaking away the familiar sensation of the spirit and the touch of the fade clawing at him like gnashing jaws in a frenzied struggle for dominance.

 _YOU WILL NOT SURRENDER WHEN YOU HAVE JUST BEGUN MAGE-_ Anxiety twisted inside, throwing his heart into an angry rhythm pounding against his ribcage yet while blissfully drowning out the spirit’s pressing. Soon he found his own voice enmeshing into the noise, but he still refused to turn and face Hawke, not wanting to see for himself the disappointment on his face. 

“Do what you have to do. Be quick about it.” 

The others remained silent to the matter, only murmuring amongst themselves as the scene played out between the two mages. It wasn’t their decision after all. To interfere without being asked was to dismiss their trust in Hawke. Aveline especially, for all her concern, still respected that it was his choice, considering his personal relationship with Anders. Even Fenris who was the most likely to speak openly in this situation still deferred to Hawke’s final judgement. 

Sebastian was the exception. He wrestled with his own emotions, stemming from both loss and outrage - the loss of the chantry and those within (namely the Grand Cleric) and outrage that the culprit still yet lived. “Why are you even debating this? If you can’t do it, then I s--” 

Presenting himself as an immovable force, Hawke stood between the would-be prince and Anders. 

“Touch him and I will send you back to Starkhaven myself. In a box.” 

Sebastian opened his mouth to object, but Hawke cut him off with a sneer and a jab of spiteful humour. “ _With a lovely ribbon_.” Making idle threats was not his way either. 

The archer made his declaration of war, his voice falling into chorus with the rising sound of clamor elsewhere in the city, all of them panic stricken and desperate. A sordid frown cut across the champion’s face briefly, but he had nothing to say to Sebastian, they hadn’t forged much of a relationship beyond agreeable acquaintance, but any hope of finding another stalwart friend in the former chantry brother was lost to the void now.

Anders felt no love lost either, but the anxiety seemed to double, eating away at his already frayed nerves. What in the blazes was Hawke doing? 

“Maker’s _breath_ -” Frustrated, Wyatt Hawke stomped around to properly confront his woeful companion, giving him no choice but to listen. **“Anders!”** he barked, in a deep alto. The intensity of his tone was startling. Wyatt was not one to yell or shout without need, rarely did he even raise his voice but this was an extenuating circumstance.

“I’m am _not_ doing this without you.” With tawny-red brows knitted together, Hawke’s face was wrought with concern, notably absent of any trace of anger or disappointment, feelings that the healer expected, almost wished to see on his lover’s face.

Body rigid in - not fear, not even uncertainty - just astonishment, Anders was thoroughly baffled. 

He simply stared at the ruddy, outstretched hand offered to him, the same one he watched expertly twirl a stave with a restrained ferocity in every battle, the hand he had shaken the day they first met and struck an accord to aid one another, the one that pulled him back from the edge more than once when ~~Justice~~ Vengeance had almost consumed him and it was that same hand which had been so gentle and loving in its touch whenever they would lay together. 

Hawke’s confidence was practically unshakeable and for someone to continually place their trust in him in spite of everything was staggering. Even now he still held onto the memory of seeing Wyatt stand up to Meredith and openly speak against her and the templars, supporting the other mages, unabashedly defying her, standing there as he shamelessly both exemplified and defended everything that she hated. That it even happened was the less impressive fact, but it was how he had done so calmly, matter-of-factly and without so much as a flare of his temper or a flicker of doubt that Anders thought on fondly. 

Perhaps he should not have been so quick to dismiss the idea of having his support even through this. 

Frequently he had stood in awe of Hawke’s courage and eagerness to fight for a cause Anders had thought only he cared about for so long. Having someone not only agree with him but to unwaveringly stand with him had come as a shock, but someone who genuinely cared about him and unabashedly loved him, despite all warnings about the trouble he would bring into a relationship? Admittedly, the thought had never crossed his mind.

“Help me. Help _us_ help the mages!” his lover’s rallying speech cut straight through the chaos of his thoughts again and brought him back to the present. “They need a leader, not a martyr, Anders.” More firm, unwavering determination. It seemed so easy, for Hawke at least.

“You’re crazy,” the blonde mage uttered in protest, in the same space as a defeated exhale, as though he had been holding his breath for days and the very wind was just knocked from him. “Why would you-”

“No, _you're_ crazy,” was the man’s sudden rebuttal. He followed up with a gentler reply, blue eyes steady and focused. Just like always. “I can’t say I am happy about this mess,” Hawke gestured at the hastily constructed barricades and blazing bonfires sealing off whole sections to the gallows, “but maker so-help-me, I love you and I told you before that I will not desert you.” 

The way his lips twitched just enough to be reassuring was almost enough to calm the turbulence in the healer’s troubled mind and once again he could feel the nervous flutters in his chest stir to life like they had their first shared night at the estate. 

He found his resolve after that, drawing upon Hawke’s endless well of confidence. It was small, still hesitant, but it was there. Anders grabbed the Champion’s hand with a firm grip and allowed himself to stand up. “How do you do that? Always know the right thing to say?”

Strong and familiar arms immediately closed around his lanky frame. 

“Not a clue, really. I just say things and hope they sound good.” 

They shared a laugh, Hawke’s shoulders and chest shaking him with every heaving chuckle. It was a welcome tenderness which helped to abate the knot that had formed in his gut earlier and the knot that would remain until after this whole ordeal was finally behind them. Anders reciprocated after an agonizing minute, wrapping his own arms around the other mage with unchecked eagerness. He buried his face in the crook of his lover’s neck relishing their closeness for as long as possible and a gentle hand tangled itself in his hair affectionately. 

“Thank you, love. I don-” but his sentence ended abruptly when Hawke gingerly pulled back and pressed his lips against the healer’s own and then to his forehead, stealing away another private moment of reassuring affection before they had to part. 

“You can thank me properly later. Now, let’s go. I don’t think the rebellion is going to wait. Even if we it ask _nicely._ ”

While he surely felt unworthy of Hawke's mercy in that moment, Anders knew he would be a fool to throw it away. There would be time to make it up to him later, if there was a later. No. There would definitely be a later. They would both see to that.


End file.
